Ah, Terrence Malick—John Muir and Henry David Thoreau's spirit animal, purveyor of all things cinematic art. The director's evocative imagery wrestles with the fabric of nature, depicting its hues of chaos and grace with unrivaled poetry. "We rise from out of the soul of you," Malick writes in his pantheistic magnum opus, The Tree of Life. 

A new video essay from Vugar Efendi threads together some of Malick's most ethereal shots. He juxtaposes windmills with blades of grass, fire with water, and prairie grass with shelves of ice to illustrate how Malick's films inspire a unique sense of wonder in the universe and our place within.​

Films included in the video essay:

  • Badlands (1973)
  • Days of Heaven (1978)
  • The Thin Red Line (1998)
  • The New World (2005)
  • The Tree of Life (2011)
  • To the Wonder (2012)
  • Knight of Cups (2015)
Video Essayterrence malicknature
DirectingCinematography & Cameras